


Further On Up The Road

by BeepBeepBitchie



Category: House of Wax (2005)
Genre: A look at Ambrose before 2005, Bo Sinclair/OC, Borderline Stockholm Syndrome, Eventual Smut, F/M, Hitchhiking is a dangerous thing my dudes, How to make an amateur serial killer 101, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Lester is a punny man with a sense of humor fight me, Murder is a thing so I wrote it into a fanfiction about slasher romance, Slow Burn, Verbal Abuse, Vincent attempts this thing called friendship, Violence is the bread and butter of the Sinclair family, Wax
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-03-02
Updated: 2018-03-02
Packaged: 2019-03-26 00:16:46
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,968
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13846044
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BeepBeepBitchie/pseuds/BeepBeepBitchie
Summary: There's something about the quiet calm of the deep south that catches you off guard, but its when the roads twist and writhe into dead ends and the land reeks of damp earth and rotten things that you've got to pick yourself up and be ready for what comes from the mouth of the godless countryside, and the hidden swamp that keeps secrets you could never comprehend.A Bo Sinclair and OC fic, where nothing is comprehensible between the crack of a gun shot and the soft gurgle of a victims last dying breath.





	Further On Up The Road

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Dedicated to Lara](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=Dedicated+to+Lara).



The rattling hiss of unseen cicadas greeted me when I wretched open the passenger side door. Immediately, the heat off the pavement was felt even in the mid morning, and as I climb down from the high of the eighteen wheeler, I breathed in my last sweet release of air conditioning, noting the hint of stale cheap tobacco and sweet cherry soda that my driver had been kind enough to share with me in the air as I did so.

“Sorry, darlin’.” He apologized again, scratching at the beard lining his jaw. “Wish I could take ya further.”

I tossed him a dismissive hand, shrugging. “You did me a favor, Dan. Don’t worry about it.”

He hesitates a second, but sighed. “Just be careful, not every driver on the road ain’t a serial killer. There's a stereotype for a reason, darlin’. Stay safe. If you follow this road ‘ere, you’ll hit a town called Beaumont. You can fill up there.”

Tugging my backpack from the floorboards, I offered him one last smile. “I’ll be careful. I’ve got a map and a compass. See you around, Dan.”

And with that, I shut the door, stepping back from the vehicle and driving myself into the tall grass and gravel beside the cracked pavement, watching as Dan rolled away, taking a turn down a road just ahead that would lead him to an interstate that would take him north. Muggy and thick, the air almost choked me as I began to walk along the roadside, glad I had stored a bottle of water in my backpack, but annoyed to realize it would be lukewarm by the time I’d take a sip next.

It had been a long three days, traveling from Wichita Falls and passing through small town after small town since, making my way diligently towards New Orleans. Hitchhiking had been an art lost on me at first, but with practice and scoring several nice truckers and compliant couples, I had drifted through Texas and Louisiana easily enough. In the deep south now, where it was all miles of road with dottings of small towns in between, I had come to grow in excitement during each interaction with my helpful companions.

Some could only take me a few hours, some just a handful of interstates over, but all had been happy to drop me off with a ‘Stay safe’ or two, worried for my safety as both a woman, and a person traveling by my lonesome.

But I liked it, the exposure to others, the long talks with stranger’s I’d surely never encounter again. Seeing little slices of lives and letting them breathe their stories, their pasts, to life as I gauged my own, made my journey all that better.

“ _ Why’re you going to New Orleans? _ ” They all asked, curiosity obvious.

The answer changed with each drive, and every time I made sure to add little dashes of truth with the lies. It wasn’t meant to be rude, or to be simple covers. It was to make it difficult to place me.

In Dallas, I had been a runaway. In Tyler, a girl hoping to catch a concert. Throughout Shreveport and beyond, I had stuck with saying I was visiting family.

That was a close enough answer, though lackluster to say the least. Someone waited for me in New Orleans, though he was none the wiser. He’d once been family, dear to me, but now, on my way with intent to see him, he was anything  _ but _ my blood.

Dan had noted that whoever I was visiting should have come picked me up in the very least, and I laughed him off, admitting my family was a little hard of complying to the standard rules of intimacy or consideration for others. We were a distant family, dinner tables full of polite murmurs, but never with any talk that had real meat to it. We never had those family vacations, or sent out christmas cards.

No, our family had been the kind others greeted awkwardly, eyes lingering on the lanky brother with an upturned and elvish nose that had eyes like dark pits, or the youngest sister with a rats nest for hair and freckles tanning her shoulders, with a nose that wrinkled in disgust when they turned their attention onto her.

They’d shake hands with the husband, ignoring the too strong grip and stagnant smell of a perfume that clung to him, despite that didn’t belong to his wife. All would warmly welcome the wife, and complement her necklace, or the statement ring she wore that was all razzle and no dazzle, so fake that it hurt like a toothache. No one would mention the ropes of bruises she hid underneath a sheen of unblended foundation, or the sore look of her painted lip, they knew better.

So it was easier to lie on the road, to forget that I was the little sister with freckled skin and messy hair, and to play a brighter human, one with promise in her future.

Mirages rose, shimmering from the pavement with iridescent pools, reminding me to drink water, to stay hydrated. After all, hundreds of people passed out from heat exposure every year, and I didn’t want to be one of them while alongside a practically abandoned road. It took a quick drop of my bag, a tag of its zipper, and I had a water bottle in hand, continuing on my way but mindful to sip once in a while.

My stomach was satiated from Dan stopping helpfully at a Mcdonalds and offering me food, which I of course took him up on, and savored the greasy cheesy goodness of a cheeseburger, chatting with him about things that had little purpose in my life. I’d told him my name was Jaime, and liked hearing the name leave his mouth anytime he wished to catch my attention during the ten hours we spent together.

“Lookit that sign, Jaime.” The trucker had nudged me from my thoughts shortly before he pulled over, pointing at a withered old thing, the billboard’s paint cracked and peeling from the heat.

‘ _ Come visit Trudy’s World Famous House of Wax! _ ’ It had said while he drove past. ‘ _ Fun for the whole family! Children Free! _ ’

“Cool.” I replied, turning my head to follow the sign, and watching the breeze brush against the high grass that acted as its skirt.

“Been driving these roads for near six years, still ain’t seen a lick of that House o’ Wax.” Dan wondered aloud, sighing softly.

That House of Wax was on my mind as I walked, wondering if it even existed anymore. It was 2002, the idea that wax museums were even relevant anymore was laughable, especially in the deep hidden south that I traveled through. But it would have been a nice distraction, to wander in the halls by famous sculptures of people I cared nothing about. Maybe there would be plaques to read about their pasts, or a sleepy old tour guide to give me their tales by mouth alone.

Wistfully, I thought of the peacefulness of that idea itself. In silence, gazing into false eyes of fallen idols, I could dissociate from all around me and just be there, in that moment. Would the exhibits be layered with dust, or shiney and new, smelling like windex and lemon cleaner? Would there be presidents? The celebrities of older times?

It didn't matter sadly, because, despite how I suddenly wished it were not a reality, I knew that Trudy’s House of Wax was gone, or a shell of what it once was. Forgotten, casted out by the construction of the interstate no doubt, and left to rot and collect dust or forgotten memories. Like me, It would be eroded from time sooner or later, and erased from the world, its existence forgotten as the earth carried on without batting an eyelash as it snuffed its lights out.

The gravel of the roadside crunched under my feet, but it was a roar of sound that made my head snap up, and behind me I could see a vehicle within the curtain of the distance. It peddled down the road, an SUV seemingly almost as massive as the eighteen wheeler I had hopped out of nearly an hour before, but seemed to slow as it came closer.

Quickly, like an instinct now, I threw out my arm and spun backwards, jutting my thumb out and hoping they’d notice.

The SUV did, approaching at a crawl, going a bit past me before coming to a halt, the engine left to idle. I turned, dropping my arm as windows rolled down and a few heads poked out, a beautiful blond regarding me with a smile that warned me instantly.

But I trotted over nonetheless, eager to meet these younger people close to my age, and see what stories i could weave for them, and them for me.

I reached the side, closing in on a door that opened a fraction, holding a hand out to snag the handle when it slammed shut.

The blond, tan skinned and gorgeous, with her dark brown eyes and perfect smile, cackled. “Syke!” 

The others in the car, a group of them all huddled together in the back seats, heaved gross laughter as well when she slammed the door shut tight. Music suddenly blared through speakers, heavy and nearly ear splitting in its volume, and the SUV shot off, peeling down the highway and swerving slightly from the speed it gained in such a short collective of time.

“FUCKERS!” I roared after them, choking on exhaust and left with my face burning not from the sun, but from shame and embarrassment. They disappeared before long, and once again, I was left to stumble over gravel and through the thick air of a Louisiana morning, alone.

Hours passed then, a quick break on the roadside with a granola bar and banana chips had given me the energy to keep on going until I reached a parting in the road. In front of me, a detour sign with flashing lights in warning, and beside it a path clear with heavy shade presented by spanish moss and low hanging trees.

I wasn't an idiot, and took the safer route, relieved to have the sun off my back by early afternoon, and followed the dirt and gravel path to a wooden plank bridge. It was wide enough for a truck liken to the SUV, and hovered over a body of stagnant water.

The lilies, though wilted and a little brown from exposure to the sunlight, were a nice change from the dense and tangled greenery that had been my scenery for the last few hours. Minnows swam through the alge riddled water, chased by tadpoles and skimming the surface with quiet ripples. The walk across the bridge was short, but a welcomed little breather to take between stomping across uneven rocky and dried up dirt with unchanging horizons. 

Dan had never specified how far way Beaumont would be, but as the road grew longer and my legs began to ache, I prayed it was closer rather than further. No cars, even rusty old pickups or rattling tractors, traveled down the paths I took, and it grinded on my nerves a little.

The air, still thick, reeked with odd breeze every once in a while. It was an awful smell, like death and something somehow worse. The scent alone had me imagining deep pits with writhing maggots and keening wings of flies, of pus covered rotting carcasses - both animal and human - laying underneath the sun and turning sour from the decay alone.

Those thoughts haunted me, forced gooseflesh to pimple my arms as I kept going, somehow with more incentive to find a town before the sunset. The road was barren of signs until hours later, with the sun lowering in the sky as it blossomed pink and violet, I saw a bent and scuffed metal plate stabbed into the earth like a spear.

**_Ambrose, Next Left, 1 Mile_ **

I paused by the sign, noticing the dimples of erosion from being weather worn, that it was that particular shade of green that meant it was official and real. Put there by the state. But it was so odd looking, to see it out in the middle of nowhere, that it struck me as positively ominous.

Still, with aching feet and worn out by the miles I had traverses that day, I decided that despite it not being Beaumont, that it would do fine.

The walk to the next turn was short, and I hung the appropriate left, catching scents of decaying leaves and a fine mist of swampy air. The road was tougher now, but clear tire tracks to could seen, assuring me that it was traversable, and I made the effort to dig my heels in, pushing past the weakness in my ankles and stomping through the gravel and sloppy pot holes.

Mosquitoes came to play, but swatting them off was not a hassle I hadn’t performed before, and by the time I stumbled across a break in the road I only had a couple bites, which I considered a victory.

The sun was hitting the line of the horizon, disappearing past treetops and curling its last golden rays across a sky that was spare of clouds, but shone with a whisper of moonlight. The expanse was beautiful, breathtaking, all paints of cerulean, pink and violet captured between the gold, and I found myself marvelling it as I approached a rip in the road, a wide bared creek that seemed to have torn its way through long ago.

The water was crystal clear, slowly weaving between rocks that served a perfect purpose of being a bridge over it, allowing me to carefully push myself from step to step until I ended up on the other side of the waterway.

“Quaint.” I murmured, hitching my backpack further on my shoulders and edging into town, past a blue sign that read in white lettering ‘ **_Ambrose_ ** ’.

The bend gave me time to think of who I would be this time, in this town. With it’s beige exterior and close knit shops, I felt it would only be appropriate to keep a simple persona. A simple, one dimensional girl, for a simple, one dimensional town. It was quiet, without a face in sight, even as I strode closer and closer to the buildings. Everything smelled stale, forgotten, heavy. Even the dirt I kicked up while shuffling past a pet store I didn't bother to peak into was too dry, unused. A small church dwelled at the far end of the one way street, the only strip of the town present, and I realized with a defeated sigh that there was no motel to crash in for the night.

Just a pet store, a little gun store, some other miscellaneous shops and a gas station. There were no benches either, which I’d have been happy to occupy for the night if it meant getting off my feet, leaving me feeling a little deflated and confused when I reached the gas station, hoping to maybe find another soul to speak with.

I wasn’t above asking for a place to sleep from a stranger.

Muffled tunes reached my ears when I rounded past the gas sign, noting it was barely over a dollar and a straight up deal, blinking rapidly under the harsh fluorescents that shot down on me when I approached the door to the station.

“Hello?” I called out, cupping hands over my eyes and peering inside the gas station, which i immediately recognized as a mechanics shop in part as well. No one to be seen, but now I could hear the music more, surprised to find it being the Deftones instead of Johnny Cash or some Hank Williams Sr.

Ambrose didn't exactly seem like the type of town to have anyone who’d listen to something as hardcore as them, and I was a little impressed by whom ever the music belonged to.

I pursed my lips, knocking against the glass, but pushed away shortly, figuring no one would hear me even if I did call out. From inside, the music had to be deafening, because it was clearly legible from outside once I had gotten close enough.

“Well, fuck.” Muttering to myself, I caught movement from across the street, a curtain parting and then dropping shut, quick as a whip.

Hopeful now, seeing another person even if it had been for a split second, made me take a step forward, ready to across the empty street and knock on a door and ask for a place to sleep or be given the offer of where else I could, I heard a crash from my right.

Flinching, I jumped to face where I heard the noise, a silver tin top of a trash can rolling through the dust as someone stumbled and staggered out from behind the gas station.

She saw me, hair matted with scarlet and shoulder dripping. The cloth of her shirt was torn from the shoulder down to her elbow, the sleeve flapping as she hurried over to me, hot tears streaming down her face as she incoherently babbled at me.

“Please, please, oh my god, please,” She sobbed, big brown eyes reflecting broken blood vessels back at me from the light of the stations fluorescents, her nose caked in thick red paste turned nearly black. She limped, her ankle a little swollen, but she still put weight on it as she came forward. “Help me, p-puh-please. Please, he’s coming.” She gasped, eyes wide, searching mine. “Help me, I don't kn-nuh-know where the others are.”

“Whoa- fuck- what-” I fumbled back, tensed up and horrified, and despite her alarming appearance, I recognized her as the blonde who had slammed a door in my face and laughed as her friends left me in their dust not but hours earlier. “Are you? Okay?”

“No!” She shrieked, spit and tears welling. “Do I fucking LOOK okay?!”

“I-”

Phone. I had a burner phone. “I’m gonna call 911, it's okay-”

I threw my backpack off, shaky hands tugging at the zipper as i dug through the phone, the blonde choking on her emotions, torn between relief and shock still. My fingers barely grazed the smooth surface of my nokia before I heard a crackle of gravel, and snapped my head up, seeing a figure emerge from where the girl had just seconds before.

I sucked in a sharp breath, a deer in headlights as the girl darted behind my kneeling form and I stood, the phone forgotten in my terror. 

He came into the light slowly, one step at a time, like a prowling predator of the jungle, the shotgun he reared in his hands the jaws that would snap my neck in two. He was a mess of sweat and dirt, dark eyes burning and eager, his navy jumpsuit favoring a mechanic splattered with red, red, and more red.

Teeth bared, jaw tight, he regarded me in bewilderment for a moment, gun cocked.

“New friend, sweetheart?” He called, a sneer really, but his voice was smooth and practiced, and the way he curled a finger by his trigger assured me he was an experienced hunter, if not killer.

Before a reaction could be made on my part, I was rolled to the ground, shoved from behind as a distraction. My palms scraped against the ground, tiny little rocks and shards of something stabbing painfully into the skin. My shoulder hit the pavement, but I steered myself expertly to the side and scrambled back up to my feet, hearing the telltale sounds of a runaway and terrified sobs echoing in my wake.

The man threw his head back, laughing, a stomach heaving shout that struck me as cold and sadistic. It was over as soon as it started and he whipped his shot gun at me jerking his chin once, eyes bright and lit with a fever I couldn't understand.

“Run.”

And I did, diving from my the path that would take me to my belongings but leave me in his way, and off into the creeping darkness. Junky and overgrown, I zipped through the back of the town, instincts screaming, my adrenaline pumping strength into my once sore and sorry feet, the ache gone, but the fear embedded in my focus like never before.

Gun. Blood. Gun. Blood.

Blood.

Gun.

_ Blood _ .

How long had it been since I’d saw it? Crimson and sticky, caked to clothes or slick on skin?

Years.

It had been years, and as I reared up an ancient hillside and avoiding a grand home and even grander museum of wax in favor of undergrowth and the camouflage of trees, I knew it would not be the last time I saw it that day.

I practically buried myself in the thick underbrush, letting it tangle around me, encompass me and hide me. Something stung, like thousands of fire ant bites and the scorching seer of lemon juice in a cut, and I knew I had brushed up against some nettles, but bit down on my tongue, keeping quiet, keeping still.

Civilization wasn’t for miles. There were no phones to call for help, and even if I turned tail and ran back the way I came, it would take hours, and I’d surely get lost in the dark. This man would be looking for me sooner or later, but if I reached town again and snagged my bag, I reasoned, I could call for the police. Or someone. Something. I’d die if I tried to run back to the road, the gunslinger lived back here, and surely knew the paths like the back of his hand.

So I waited, covered in bushes, grass and stinging plants, making no sound and staying still. Unless someone came running through with a weed whacker, I was safe, that much I knew.

Soft, easy, but restless, breaths left me as the night drew on. Just when I’d think about leaving my hiding spot and sprinting back to my bag, I’d hear a scream, or the shot of a gun. Once I’d heard a dog bark, and the idea that a hound could be running about spooked me enough to negate the thought of running into town for a whole hour it seemed.

I counted, I waited, sticky and dirtied by rotting leaves and my own sweat, the smell of damp earth mixing with natural rot.

Finally, I’d had enough. The air was quiet, the trickle of a the creek heard in the distance, but nothing else. Slowly, I rose, my movements patient and weary as I collected myself from the ground and began to slink in the shadows underneath a blanket of stars and treetops. The lights of the town beckoned me when I appeared out of the forest behind the grand house, slipping past a pickup truck dusted in mud and grime, before inching back against a huddle of trees, barely bringing myself beside a building I’d wish were anywhere else.

House of Wax, as it was called, was dark and haunting, beige and yellow from the soft light casted out from street lamps, the inside lit with lamps just barely. I supposed this was Trudy’s House of Wax, and thought wistfully to myself that it as never meant to be, for me to see what the museum held. It was a bitter melancholy feeling, but I suddenly was reminded of what Dan had said in the truck.

_ “Been driving these roads for near six years, still ain’t seen a lick of that House o’ Wax.” _

Of course he hadn't.

Hours, even by car, away from the highways and through a maze of backroads, it was carefully hidden from sight. Lost in a ghost town, where no one seemed to live aside from a man with a gun, and someone who peeked through a window at the gas station.

A crunch from behind me, and I turned, whipping my head back and pushing off from the trees I had hidden myself with, ready to run again.

The girl from before was there, wading close by through the knee high grass with the help of someone else, a friend of hers I guessed, who looked in better shape, with just a cut on his cheek and mud lining his pants.

“Shush- It’s fine- It’s okay.” The guy whispered, too loudly for my taste, and making me jerk my head around, in search of a threat they deemed missing. “It’s fine, are you okay? Are you hurt?”

“Lower your voice.” I murmured, keeping a finger to my lips, pressing them tightly together, eyes searching behind them. I didn't trust what they brought, seeing as the last time I encountered the blonde, she had shoved me into the way of a gun.

“We lost him.” The guy said, lowering his voice some, and he came closer. My hand shot out and I regarded them coldly, shadows falling over raised bumps on my arms from the stings of nettles and whatever else had been in the ground with me.

“Quiet.” I warned again, and this time he listened, clamping his mouth shut as the blonde beside him panted softly at his side, clearly injured more so than before.

I listened beyond the blondes breathing, cicadas chirping and a ringing tune singing through the night, vaguely opera in its sound, but close by. A second passed, and then another, more stressed than the one before.

The boy opened his mouth to speak and it was then I heard what I’d been straining to recognize, a crunch of leaves not to far away, and I threw myself down to the ground with a grunt, the roar of a gunshot splitting my ears. A dull thud reached me, and I winced, lifting my head through the fallen leaves and dirt, seeing the boy from before crumpled on the ground.

He pooled blood quickly, the liquid licking at his side like black ink in the darkness, and I shut my eyes tight, forbidding myself to commit it to memory while I heard distraught shrieks and gasps over the rush of blood in my ears, which pounded like my quickening heart.

“Ian!” The blonde sobbed, ignoring me as I picked myself up and kicked off from the ground.

I wanted to forget Ian and his sandy blond curls, and the empathetic look in his eyes when he approached me, like a prey animal hoping to group with a feral animal. But I knew I wouldn’t when the blonde stumbled and caught me, hanging off my arm and dragging me with her back to the ground.

“Please don’t leave me! Please!”

She begged and I heard the gunslinger, his nefarious cackle shooting white hot adrenaline through me like heroin, pumping terror through my bloodstream.

“Get  _ OFF _ me!” I screamed, and nailed her with the side of my closed fist, fighting her wailing form off me. Eyes fierce, teeth gritted, I was aware of oncoming steps, from behind and infront of me.

Two. There were two of them.

I shoved her off, and rolled, pushing off her as leverage and trying to sprint away down the hill towards town. She followed, and I swore, allowing a scream to leave me when a hulking mass slid into view, thick greasy hair falling across his face. Even through the light of the moon and the way his hair fell to cover his face, I saw that it was frozen in apathey, expressionless and solid.

A dead pit froze me, the other eye, a brown matching that of the gunslinger’s, held me. His shoulders squared, a machete in one hand, wet with scarlet, and he took a single step forward before the blonde slammed into me , seeing the man in front of us and wailing in a pitch so high it could have woke the dead.

“No! No! No!” She hung from my shoulder, against me, and I whirled, seeing the navy jumpsuit and cruel smile behind me, only to tear myself from their path, giving myself the advantage of watching them both.

“We’re gonna die, we’re gonna die, no-”

The blonde sang her sobs and I let out a snarl of frustration, snatching her by the golden strands on her head, spinning her to face the men advancing.

“You want her?” I hissed, digging nails into her scalp as she yelped in pain. “Fucking, TAKE her.”

With all the strength I could muster I hurled her forward, kicking a dirty boot against her back for emphasis, sending her sprawling into the dirt. The larger man, swathed in a cloak and frozen mask, bared down on her, hand grabbing her throat and drawing her up as she choked and struggled to no use of her own. He placed a hand over her mouth, stopping her cries.

I saw the shotgun cocked in my direction, but threw my hands up, staring at the man who held it with fire in my eyes.

“Nice little show, Darlin’.” He drawled slowly as he took a step forward, watching me with an unreadable expression.

I backed towards the trees, my only way of escape, again. “I want to live.”

It was quiet, my plea, but strong. Insistent.

“Ain’t no one enters Ambrose and lives, sweetheart. That's just how it is.” He replied smoothly, and I saw the tilt of his shoulders, my legs breaking into a run before he could even make a move of the trigger.

A shot, hollow until it snapped a branch of a closely tree, was heard behind me. 

“Fuck!” He cursed, ripping a snarl from his lips and sprinting right on after me. “Get back here, whore!”

The terrain was horrendous to maneuver in the dark, uneven, wet and dense, but I tore through it like hurricane. Footfalls, furious and heavy, followed me like the looming shadow of death ready to take me with him, and it only encouraged me to push harder, further.

My lungs burned, my claves ached and felt raw, but I kept going. Jumping over branches, turning myself around, zig zagging through the bushes, and sloshing through a gap of the creek, I carved my way through the forest with only survival in mind.

I lost him in no time, only dropping to my knees and gasping for breath when I could trust that he was really of my tail for good. My own tears came then, sobs silenced as I bit down on my fist to keep from making too much noise.

Revulsion. Horror. Terror.

I felt it all, building and tearing at the seams in my mind, a tidal wave dropping over me wirth each vivid and soul wracking tremor that ripping through my body. Laying there, in a pile of dirt, rotting leaves, and thick underbrush, I caught to keep my thoughts straight and coherent until exhaustion caught me and I curled in on myself, shaking like a leaf in a windstorm, allowing myself to rest for a moment and not a second longer.

I’m shocked awake after whats feels like mere seconds, disoriented and lost before the night comes back to me while I blink furiously in the barely-there sunlight that tries to dive between the high tops of the trees sheltered above me. Ambrose. Guns. Two men. Death. Blood.

Memories rush back as I sluggishly make a move to sit, the palms of my hands scarred and torn up, sore and raw to the touch as i gingerly brush fingertips against the skin. I pick rocks out as I think, trying to position myself, attempting to collect useful tidbits of memory from the night before when I had sprinted through the woods like a madman.

It's in that silence that I heard a gurgle of water, soft but close by. My eyes wandered over the plants and trees, to where I saw a dip in the incline just ahead of me. I picked myself up, tense and feeling the burn of an ache that ran up and down my legs like the hottest fires of hell, my footsteps fumbling while I stumbled to the drop point. 

It was a blessing in my eyes to see the creek, clear and unassuming, and I wasted no time in scaling down the steep bend, cursing when my footfalls dug to deep and made it clear I had found myself there. I didn't want to be clumsy and obvious, that was how hunters found their deer, by following the paths they made in the dirt or the coat hair that snagged in gnarled branches.

I wouldn't be the deer. Not if I could help it. I swore this to myself as I dropped to kneel by the waterside, seeing a reflection that pinched and rolled my stomach as easily as a corpse would.

My hair, a rats nest by all rights, had braids of mud and wet leaves, tangled and twisted into a mess that put me to shame. I counted myself lucky to only have bloody palms, the dark russet color staining my jean jacket from the blonde and not myself, I thought, counting my lucky stars.

I dunked my hands in the water, muddling my reflection, and smacked handfuls of water against my face, the sting of the icy water waking me up more than the lingering adrenaline from the night before.

I rubbed dirt and grime off me, the rolled sleeves of my jacket showing the rash and bumps that littered my arms, pink and puckered, only fleetingly relieved by the chill of the creek, then setting right back onto itching and burning once the water rolled right off my limbs.

Carefully I brought my cupped hands to my lips, gulping what the creek offered greedily, and reveling in the taste.

Water had never been so sweet against my torn up throat, stripped painful by the panting and ragged breathing I had forced myself through the night before.

With my thirst satiated and face clean, I worked quick fingers through my knots and tangles, tossing leaves and dried mud to the side, wetting the worst of the strands and threading the filth out, still vigilant and listening for sounds of someone approaching, but heard none as I fixed myself up.

I stood, the air thickening as the morning rolled on, digging my boots into rocks by the water and moving myself down wind, remembering how the river had spilled a certain way, and following myself toward where I hoped Ambrose would be waiting.

I needed my phone. My bag. Something, anything. With two men looking for me, a deserted town left for me to investigate in search of my bag, and with no real way out, I knew this was my best option.

Unless, I wanted to turn around and try to find the main road.

I paused, fingers itching at my side, glancing over my shoulder.

I considered it, but it had been a tough walk before, and that was after starting out with fresh and relaxed legs, not sore and burning ones that creaked and almost forced groans out of me with each step. Then, I remembered with a jolt of weariness, the pick up truck.

If the gunslinger saw me, or the man with a machete, I’d be snatched up faster than I could scream.

I turned back forward, and made my way a little brisker down the waterway, covered in shade by the tree tops and spanish moss, smelling wet earth and a sweet allure of honeysuckle as I walked.

I hesitated during a clearing of the trees, speeding back into the cover of shade before I could possibly be seen, and hurrying down the creek, leaving it behind me in fear I’d be found out in the open like that.

Maybe twenty minutes passed before I saw a beige husk of a building and slowed, the ground evening out as it lowered to an open creekbed and I saw the gap I had crossed the night before in the distance, now accompanied by a truck that was straight out of a horror film itself.

I climbed into a snag of bushes again, careful to keep my movements practically soundless, settling close against my hiding spot, hidden while peeking through the blinds of leaves.

A man I had yet to see leaned against the side of the truck, fiddling absently with a knife, its blade glinting in the morning light while I committed him to memory.

A foul odor broke through a breeze, my nose wrinkling, but I knew it originated from the mystery man and his vehicle, which was encased in thick blood, clumps of something soft looking and wet, as well as saw tools and disposed hooves  and paws of various animals, their remains clapping together in the small wind that whipped against Ambrose.

The truck was battered up, a right piece of junk, and part of me was wowed that the filthy man leaning against the vehicle isn't causing it to break apart on the spot.

He perked up, lifting his head, and I held my breath, worried he was going to look my way, and felt a shudder of relief when his head face towards town and he peeled himself from the truck.

“Bo! You’ve got me waitin’ damn near all mornin’!” He hollered, accent thick and distinctly just so  _ Louisiana _ . Squinting, he tucked his knife away at his hip, throwing a hand up in greeting as a man clad in a black suit crossed the creek with ease, stepping on each rock without batting an eye at the effort, face fresh and clean shaven, dark hair slicked back in a handsome style. Cicadas shrieked as he wandered over, a bag hung across his arm and a thin cigarette between the fingers of his other hand.

Bo regarded the man coldly, shouldering a backpack I knew was my own up higher on his shoulder while he shoved a cigarette between his lips. He patted his pocket, procuring a lighter and easily lit it, sucking deep drags and letting smoke curl in tendrils from his mouth before finally speaking.

“We gotta fuckin’ runaway, Lester. I don’t give no two shits if you’ve been here since the dawn of fuckin’ time. Bigger fish to fry. Some girl got away.”

His voice was all too familiar and I mentally swore, finding the handsome man to be the gunslinger from the night before. Bo took a another drag, Lester scratching at his dirty neck with grimy fingers.

“I ain’t see no reason why you’re worried.” Lester said, shrugging. “If I see ‘er on the roads I’ll snatch ‘er up. If she gets in town, you or Vince’ll get ‘er, right?”

“Fat chance. Vince is holed up in his dungeon. Not gettin’ that bitch out until he’s carved out a few figures. Even then, he said we should let the girl go. Said she’ll die of exposure or whatever the fuck.” Bo scoffed, tipping ash to the dirt with a click of his tongue. “Reckon she’ll try and come for this.”

I watched as he patted the bag, annoyed that he had retrieved it already.

“Any chance she gots a phone?” Lester asked, clearly a little nervous by the prospect of me having the ability to make a call for help.

“Nah. Bitch left it in her bag.” Bo smirked, and keened his eyes to the trees opposite of me. “Nah, she’s in the forest right now. Ran there after she tossed some chick at Vince. Sacrificed her in no time flat, really.”

“What now then? Want me to go after ‘er?”

The offer as denied, Bo waving a hand after he expelled another cloud of smoke. “I’m going in with the hound. He’s useless, but maybe he’ll pick up a scent. You keep your ass on the road. She had road maps, a compass, and a change of clothes in here.” He patted the bag again. “She’s a runaway, or a hitchhiker or somethin’. She’s gonna be tryin’ to either make it back here for the bag or runnin’ the opposite direction. Between the two of us, she’ll be found, I’m sure.”

The sly grin he wore, the way his voice lowered dangerously, and how his tongue came to wet his lips ran a shiver down my spine, but I kept watch, dead silent and waiting, even as the men parted with half assed waves in farewell.

The truck straight out of my nightmares idled away and before long, I could hear the echo of a bark in the far distance, which is what decided my next move, to where I emerged from the bushes and dove into the town, barks growing further and further away as I approached, telling me Bo had head deep into the forest in search of me.

So I snuck around, watching high and low for any signs of Lester, Bo, or the man with long hair I supposed was Vincent. I slowly came up with a plan, finding it dastardly and foolish, but knew would keep me alive.

So that's all I had in mind when I inched up the steps of the lonely house at the top of a rocky hill, palms sweaty and knees quaking as I made it to the door, turning the unlocked knob and pushing it open with the softest of creaks.

As long as I stayed out of the way, my chances of surviving improved, and that's what mattered. I told this to myself as I stepped inside, and repeated it, even as the door shut tight behind me, in enemy territory and left to my own devices.


End file.
